Remco Evenepoel appeared sceptical when he discovered final October that the Tour de France would characteristic a gravel stage within the coronary heart of the Champagne area this 12 months.
A hesitant show on the gravel roads of the Giro d’Italia on stage 11 in 2021 was maybe at the back of the Belgian’s thoughts when the Tour route was introduced in Paris final Autumn. However Evenepoel shouldn’t be the form of rider to permit previous worry to have an effect on his willingness to race.
Three years on and Evenepoel got here alive on the chemins blancs round Troyes, throwing down the gauntlet to Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogačar with an aggressive, all-in show, launching a flurry of assaults trying to power a cut up within the yellow jersey group behind stage winner Anthony Turgis.
One week into the Tour and Evenepoel, 33 seconds down on Pogačar, is steadily rising because the Slovenian’s greatest challenger for general victory in Good, a standing he seems completely comfortable with on debut.
After amassing a contemporary white jersey as greatest younger rider after the stage, Evenepoel mentioned that he had been left dissatisfied with Vingegaard’s show. Whereas the Belgian and Pogačar seemed to gentle up the race, Vingegaard and his Visma-Lease a Bike teammates most popular to mark assaults and sit on the wheel as a substitute of driving offensively.
“I feel Tadej [Pogačar] and I weren’t proud of this as a result of I feel perhaps the rostrum for the Tour may have been determined at the moment already,” Evenepoel instructed journalists after being requested for his tackle Vingegaard’s show.
“We have now to simply accept race techniques and race conditions, however generally you additionally want the balls to race. Sadly perhaps Jonas didn’t have them at the moment.”
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He added: “I completely settle for the explanation why he didn’t pull, why he didn’t race however after all Tadej and I each prefer to assault fairly far-off from the end and we wished to proceed, however Jonas is typically a bit extra defensive. We have now to simply accept it, he could have a lot of good causes to race like this so additionally I utterly perceive why.
“I used to be by no means in hassle, aside from one time on I feel sector eight, the place there was a little bit of a difficult scenario simply in entrance of me and I needed to shut a niche however in the long run all the things was below management. I had good legs and I am blissful it’s a relaxation day tomorrow now.”
In the course of the chaos of the stage, Vingegaard was compelled to vary onto the bike of his teammate, Jan Tratnik, after a mechanical challenge which arguably impacted his means to race.
“He [Vingegaard] was doing unimaginable for this example,” Visma-Lease a Bike’s Matteo Jorgenson mentioned afterwards. “To have a distinct attain, totally different bars, totally different brakes, all the things, it was spectacular to see. Additionally, he’s simply so gentle that on the gravel, it’s simply actually not suited to him. However he did a very good job and I’m pleased with him. I’m simply glad we obtained ourselves out of it.”
Regardless of slight hints of frustration, Evenepoel appeared calm and assured as he dissected the stage, explaining that he seemed to make the most of the climate and “heavy legs” when he launched an assault from distance, trying to disrupt the state of play within the yellow jersey group.
He mentioned: “I knew that this was one of many final arduous sectors that we have been going to do on the gravel sectors and I simply wished to go for it, it was a quick cross-tailwind so it made it a really quick sector. If we got here to the entrance group and we had returned all collectively then I feel the race may have been determined there. However like I mentioned, it is a race scenario, race techniques and we’ve to simply accept that.”
